Shamikh Badra, youth leader of the Palestine People's Party, speaking
at a forum in Perth during his Australian tour. Badra is touring Australia thanks to socialist
youth group Resistance. Filmed by Zeb Parkes for Green Left TV.

Shamikh Badra interviewed by Patrick Harrison

August 12, 2012 -- Green Left Weekly -- Shamikh Badra is the youth and students
coordinator for the Palestinian People Party (PPP) in the Palestinian
Gaza Strip. The PPP is a left-wing, secular party that is part of the
Palestinian liberation movement. Badra is on a tour of Australia sponsored by the socialist youth organisation Resistance and the Socialist Alliance.

* * *

Since the Egyptian revolution that overthrew Mubarak, there
has been a lot of hope for changes in Egypt's policy towards Israel — in
particular the possibility that the Egyptian government might open its
borders with Gaza and alleviate Israel's near-total siege on the
territory. How has the relationship between Gaza and Egypt changed?

Now the borders between Gaza and Egypt are closed completely. The
situation, which was so bad before, is even more difficult and complex.

Many needs for Palestinians are increased. They suffer from a lack of
electricity as they previously suffered but it has worsened, all the
crises are increased. Gaza now is isolated from the whole world. No-one
can enter Gaza or go out from Gaza.

We hear in the media that the crossing is open, the blockade is
ended. But on the ground it is another thing. Right now many people are
gathered in Cairo airport who cannot go home. What we see in propaganda
is one thing and what is on the ground is another.

What is the relationship between the PPP and Hamas in Gaza?

We should co-ordinate between all the Palestinian parties. To be
frank, we have differences between our program and that of Hamas. In
spite of that, we co-ordinate on national issues of struggle against the
Israeli occupation because we have one enemy, which is the occupation.

But sometimes (most of the time) we have a lot of differences on many
things. We seek, with all progressive movements and parties in
Palestine, to achieve national unity with all parties and we want
reconciliation. This is the first step in order to prepare for
parliamentary and presidential elections, and Palestinian Liberation
Organisation (PLO) elections. I think this will begin to address the
problems in Palestine; we need elected leadership for the Palestinian
Authority and the PLO, chosen by the people.

We seek, as a progressive party, to reinforce the democracy and human
rights in our society. We defend women's rights — women have played an
important role in the struggle against the occupation. Negotiations for
unity between Palestinian groups is the only way to solve the problems
we face. And we seek to achieve the social justice and peace and to
develop our society.

What is the PPP's position on the Palestinian Authority, has
it been involved in the movement for a unity government in the last
year?

We are involved in this movement and have a lot of initiatives for
national unity between all parties, not just Hamas and Fatah, and we
organise a lot of demonstrations in co-ordination with other parties to
push those two sides to achieve reconciliation. The PPP refuses to
participate in either the Fayyad government or Haniyeh government — as
we see participating in these governments as deepening the divide
between the two sides of our nation.

What role does the grassroots struggle play in Palestine?

The protests challenge the occupation. As long as we ask the
international solidarity movements to visit us in Gaza, we ask them to
go also to the West Bank. In the West Bank there is a real battle
between the Palestinians and the occupation. The occupation is expanding
the settlements, building the Apartheid Wall which separates the
Palestinian territories – so we need solidarity from all the
international progressive delegations.

I think non-violent resistance is very important. It publicises the
crimes of the Israeli occupation. We believe in these demonstrations.
Our party is active in these demonstrations and wants to co-ordinate
with all the left parties around the world to participate with us.
Palestine is an international issue, not just a local one for us.

How much influence do the left wing forces have in Palestine?

I think the progressive and left parties, they have power when
gathering together — then we can influence and push the two sides of the
division that exists right now. But I think we need to have a strategy
between these parties to organise.

We can talk about the thousands of people who are members of our
parties, but we can gather a lot of people not from our parties, who
want to end the division. When we organised demonstrations in March last
year to achieve reconciliation between the parties, a lot of people
participated in the Gaza Strip and West Bank— 10,000 or more around
Palestine.

After a few days of these demonstrations, the [Hamas-led] government
in Gaza arrested the people who organised these demonstrations, and the
[Fatah-led] government in Ramallah also arrested people and used
violence to prevent these demonstrations. I myself was arrested; for
eight hours, they questioned me, and after the intervention of the
national parties, I got out.

I think people need to be encouraged to struggle to end the
occupation, to change the bad situation. We have seen a lot of people
are afraid, so we should encourage them to take action; this is our
mission as left parties.

What is the PPP's view on calls for a one-state solution to the occupation?

As the PPP, after the peace process has failed, our perspective is
that we must go to the international community to ask for international
recognition of our state on the 1967 borders [the Palestinian West Bank
and Gaza territories occupied by Israel since 1967] and to seek
admission to the United Nations.

This is because we believe this is a crucial step that will
contribute to end the occupation and the realisation of Palestinian
rights. The right of self-determination of Palestinian people, like that
of all peoples, is an inalienable right that is not up for
negotiations.

The establishment of our state is the natural, legal, historical right for the Palestinians.

We need a practical solution. For 70 years statehood for Palestine
has been a promise of the international community, the solution accepted
by the international community, but despite all that we couldn't
realise it. How could we achieve a solution which is not even acceptable
to the international community under these conditions?

The one-state solution [in which there is one democratic state based
on historic Palestine in which all citizens enjoy equal rights] is good,
but there are no practical steps towards achieving this. We would have
to change the world first. We wish to achieve this solution -- but how?

If we can establish a state for Palestinians, this would be an
important step. The Israeli occupation is comfortably settled in now
because we do not have a state, but if we achieve this we can advance
the struggle against the occupation.

How does the PPP relate to Palestinians inside Israel?

We co-ordinate with progressive parties in Arab Israeli communities
in historical Palestine, and we coordinate also with Israeli Communist
Party (Rakah). This party stands against the occupation and against the
movement of Zionism.

This party struggles in order to defend the rights of the Arabs
inside Israel. This party believes in Palestinian rights; it was formed
from our comrades before the Nakba and with Jewish people against
occupation and Zionism. So we have a good relation, we act together as
one party.

In this party, there are a lot of writers, poets; they clarify by
their writings the crimes of the Israeli occupation and confirm the
heritage of Palestinian people, the culture and the civilization of
these people, such as Tawfiq Ziad, a poet and one of the leaders of the
party, and many others.

What role does the grassroots struggle play in Palestine?

The protests challenge the occupation. As long as we ask the
international solidarity movements to visit us in Gaza, we ask them to
go also to the West Bank. In the West Bank there is a real battle
between the Palestinians and the occupation. The occupation is expanding
the settlements, building the Apartheid Wall which separates the
Palestinian territories -- so we need solidarity from all the
international progressive delegations.

I think non-violent resistance is so important. It publicises the
crimes of the Israeli occupation. We believe in these demonstrations.
Our party is active in these demonstrations and wants to co-ordinate
with all the left parties around the world to participate with us.
Palestine is an international issue, not just a local one for us.